Brian Hayes (Dublin South West, Fine Gael)

Of course, they will not do that, because their own arrogance stands in the way. This is e-voting all over again, Dublin-wide. A Minister, caught in the headlights, realising he made the wrong call some years ago in going into Government with Fianna Fáil, has now decided he must leave his imprint on the office because he knows he is out the door within six months, and this is his contribution. It is not serious. It is evident that Fianna Fáil has taken over the Green Party lock, stock and barrel.

We had a fantastic speech by the Minister in which he told us the new mayor would be similar to Rudy Giuliani one minute and Boris Johnson the next. The mayor was going everything. Let us consider the question of oversight. The Mayor of London has an assembly - directly elected - which is clearly responsible for ensuring the mayor does his job. There will be no oversight of this new mayor. He or she is to speak once a year, as I understand it, to the four local authorities of Dublin, but will take no questions and there will be no oversight of what he or she does. There are also fundamental questions of financial accountability and whether the mayor is answerable to anyone. The Mayor of London is directly responsible for the budgets of Transport for London, the Greater London Authority, the London Development Agency, the Metropolitan Police Service and the London Fire Brigade. He sets their budgets. What will our new mayor do? He will advise the four local authorities on their budgets. If he disagrees with their budgets he will state that in a written document, but the four authorities can go on with their plans anyway if they append the mayor's comments to their budgets. That really make a difference. This new mayor will be writing reports to each of the four authorities, but they still have the power to determine a budget. This is completely unlike the case of London, where the mayor has direct financial responsibility for the five areas I have mentioned.

The key issue of transport was mentioned by Deputy Hogan. I will give some examples in this regard. If ever there was a need to bring together all the agencies and providers, public and private, and demand some joined-up thinking, it is in the area of public transport in Dublin city and county. However, the Minister's mayor will not be able to direct any of that. He will not be able to interfere on a day-to-day basis with the running of the bus and railway system in the Dublin region. He will not be able to increase or decrease public transport fares. He will not be able to do anything about taxis - we have a Commission for Taxi Regulation which is nothing to do with the mayor. He will not be able to introduce congestion charges as he will have no power to do so. That is the point. If the mayor cannot do these things, why exactly are we imposing this additional layer of bureaucracy on the people of Dublin, when the existing system is not working? This is something the Minister of State needs to answer in the course of this debate.

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